Update

Congressional Briefings

October 9, 2018

Congressional Briefings Gallery

OCTOBER 9, 2018

CONGRESSIONAL BRIEFINGS

The American Kratom Association, in collaboration with a number of other kratom advocacy groups, co-hosted two standing-room only briefings, Tuesday, October 9, 2018. The first was held for Members and staff of the U.S. House of Representatives, the second for the United States Senate. Video, photographs, statements, and other information related to those briefings are available here to be reviewed and shared.

The views, opinions, and scientific conclusions expressed by the panel members who participated in the Congressional Briefings on kratom are their own views, and no one should interpret their comments as endorsements of the positions of any of the advocacy organizations who hosted this event.

In his testimony he discussed the turmoil his family went through for nearly ten years as his son suffered through mental health issues. Those problems first occurred in college and led to treatment by the best doctors at the Mayo Clinic and then Johns Hopkins. Later he received electroconvulsive therapy which didn’t work.

“Out of desperation and unbeknownst to us, he began taking kratom. Within a few days, he began to experience remission of his symptoms which was immediately noticeable to all of us close to him,” Dr. Holcomb reports. “I want to say specifically that Kratom does not make him high, loopy, forgetful, or anything but normal. He now lives independently, has maintained the same full-time job for the past 2 1/2 years, maintains healthy relationships, is pleasant and responsible, reestablished contact with his sister and brother, and is largely a happy normal person.”

Dr. Chisolm is an expert on addiction and the consequences of drug use, and serves as adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. She is also the mother of a 25-year-old son with opioid use disorder.

She was unable to attend the Oct. 9, 2018, event but submitted this testimony noting that, “I am actually terrified about the possibility of a kratom ban and its effects on my own son and family. After four years of languishing (two prior to buprenorphine treatment, and two during buprenorphine treatment), my son is finally beginning to flourish. Kratom is his lifeline. Without that, he will be at high risk of illicit drug use, overdose, and death – as will thousands of others in this country.”

Memorandum

The following documents can be downloaded together or individually

A substantial body of emerging science and research are validating both the basic safety of the natural plant for consumer use and documenting the fact the concerns about kratom are actually derivative of adulteration and contamination of kratom products, or deaths actually caused by polydrug use or unrelated health or social conditions of the decedents that do not support any regulatory action against kratom.

The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) confirmed this safety profile for kratom in its September 20, 2018 update to the DrugFacts publication as follows:

Can a person overdose on kratom?

In 2017, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) began issuing a series of warnings about kratom and now identifies at least 44 deaths related to its use, with at least one case being investigated as possible use of pure kratom. Most kratom associated deaths appear to have resulted from adulterated products (other drugs mixed in with the kratom) or taking kratomalong with other potent substances, including illicit drugs, opioids, benzodiazepines, alcohol, gabapentin, and over-the-counter medications, such as cough syrup. Also, there have been some reports of kratom packaged as dietary supplements or dietary ingredients that were laced with other compounds that caused deaths.

The following documents can be downloaded individually or with the link to the right. Download All

Document 1: Patterns of Kratom use and health impact in the US – results from an online survey; Grundmann; Drug and Alcohol Dependence, 2017.

There are nearly 5 million kratom users in the United States, and surveys show that kratom is primarily used by a middle-aged (31 – 50 years), middle income ($35,000 and above) population for purposes of self-treating pain (68%) and emotional or mental conditions (66%). Consumers report that kratom had only mild negative effects.

Research confirms that MG, the main kratom alkaloid, does not have abuse or addiction potential and actually reduces morphine intake – a desired characteristic for any candidate pharmacotherapies for opiate addiction and withdrawal. The potential bad-actor 7-OH alkaloid constitutes only 2% of the alkaloid content of the kratom plant and has no significant pharmacological effect on consumers.

This is an important study that addresses the addictive potential of kratom using the most well-accepted and relied upon animal model. It shows that the major naturally occurring constituent responsible for the health-related effects of kratom, mitragynine, is of very low abuse potential. A second substance, 7-hydroxymitragyine, that naturally occurs at such low levels in kratom that it might be of minimal health consequence, has higher abuse potential.

This has at least two regulatory implications: (1) the finding does not support FDA’s claim that kratom is a narcotic-like opioid, and (2) in regulating kratom products, FDA could set standards to ensure that no kratom product contain levels of 7-hydroxymitraginine exceeding those that are commonly present in kratom leaves and products. The study also showed that mitragynine treatment reduced morphine self-administration, an effect consistent with the self-reported use of kratom to reduce opioid craving and use, and consistent with the conclusion that mitragynine is the predominant active constituent in kratom.

Document 5: The medicinal chemistry and neuropharmacology of kratom: A preliminary discussion of a promising medicinal plant and analysis of its potential for abuse, Kruegel, Grundmann, Neuropharmacology, 2017.

Despite assertions by the FDA, research confirms that kratom and its alkaloids are not functionally identical to opioids, and their mechanisms of action are distinctly different.

Document 6: Unintentional Fatal Intoxications with Mitragynine and O-Desmethyltramadol from the Herbal Blend Krypton; Kronstrand, Roman, Thelander, and Eriksson, Journal of Analytical Toxicology, Vol. 35, May 2011. The nine Sweden deaths actually were the result of the contamination and adulteration of the powdered kratom product with a toxic dose of O-desmethyltramadol, a chemical formulation of the opioid Tramadol.

Document 7: Henningfield 8-Factor Analysis addressing the requirements for scheduling under the CSA, submitted to the DEA in November 2016.

Document 8: The abuse potential of kratom according to the 8 factors of the controlled substances act: implications for regulation and research, Psychopharmacology, 23 December 2017

Kratom does not cause deaths and does not have the same effects of classic opioids on the respiratory system that would support any scheduling of kratom.

The FDA death reports do not document any death exclusively caused by kratom.

Document 11: The FDA Kratom Death Data: Exaggerated Claims, Discredited Research, and Distorted Data Fail to Meet the Evidentiary Standard for Placing Kratom as a Schedule I Controlled Substance, March 2018, Jane Babin, Ph.D., Esq., University of San Diego School of Law, J.D., Purdue University, Ph.D., Molecular Biology. Any deaths alleged to be associated to the use of kratom merely document the possible use of kratom products at the time of the occurrence of a death caused by other specific factors, i.e., where the cause of death is related to a gunshot wound; a suicide related to mental health issues; physical injuries that caused ancillary medial issues resulting in a fatality; use of an illegal drug; polydrug use of prescription and/or illegal drugs as toxic dose levels; and deaths that are related to other unrelated medical conditions that have no relationship to kratom use, i.e., a death from deep vein thrombosis.

Of the 44 claimed deaths, the FDA identifies only a single death as being kratom-related involving an individual who “had no known historical or toxicologic evidence of opioid use, except for kratom.” The FDA refuses to release any additional information on the death other than the subject’s age and ethnicity and provides no information on how kratom was determined to have contributed to the death.

Document 13: CPDD/NIDA International Kratom Symposium Summary Slides, June 9, 2018. Kratom use produces a similar addiction profile to caffeine, and its effects are mild in contrast to the psychosocial and physiological effects relative to that of opioids.

Document 14:FDA Docket FDA-2018-N-0987 comments submitted by Jack E. Henningfield, VP of Research and Policy at PinneyAssociates, and Adjunct Professor of Behavioral Sciences at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, May 18, 2018.

Document 15: CPDD 2018, Poster on Kratom and its Mitragynines in the Opioid Crisis: A Path to or Away from Opioids, Henningfield, Raffa, Garcia-Romeu, Doshi. A ban on kratom actually increases the public safety risk as patients using kratom are force to (1) used NSAID medications that have serious documented adverse health risks; (2) use dangerously addictive and potentially deadly opioids; or (3) seek kratom on the black market where adulteration, contamination, and dangerously formulated kratom products have been identified.

Document 18: Science Letter to Kellyanne Conway, Counselor to the President, and Robert W. Patterson, Acting Administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration, February 8, 2018.

Document 19: American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics (ASPET) letter (representing 5,000 members) letter to Acting Administrator Robert W. Patterson of the DEA, arguing that placing kratom on Schedule I would “effectively eliminate an important avenue of research that has the potential to ameliorate the effects of the ongoing opioid crisis and possible lead to more effective treatments of pain.”